BRITAIN'S FOOD PROBLEM.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 14284, 28 April 1917, Page 6

BRITAIN'S FOOD PROBLEM.

KITOHEN MUST HELP AS WELL AS WORKSHOP AND TRENCHES.

LLOYD GEORGE'S PINE DECISION

(Australian and N.Z. Cable Association.) (Received February 28, 1.30 p.m.) LONDON, April 27. . Mr Lloyd George, m his speech at the Guildhall,- outlined the steps taken by Government, departments to deal with the food, problem. He said that farmers are now cultivating ten per centum more land) than before the war. The farmers liad been given a guarantee, so had his laborers, and after feverish activity m the last few months we had a million acres of fresh land under cultivation, meaning an addition of two million tons of food.

*T am not going to say that the war will continue ©through 1918," he. added, I'but we must take no chances. We have taken f-ir too many. If the German knows that by holding on until the end m 1918, he can win by starving us, hr will hold out, but he also knows that the longer he holds out the worse it will b< for him ; hence peace might come much earlier.

"We are taking steps now for the harvest of 1918. and not a minute too soon. Three million fresh acres of land are being put into cultivation, and even without a ton of food being brought from abroad no one can starve, but al" must help.. You save your rations, keep to them. The kitchen must help as M r ell as the workshop and trenches."

(Rioeived April 28. 3.15 p.m.) If those steps for cultivation had beei taken a year or eighteen months ago we should have had np danger about food now. We might have liad enough wheat, but ivould have been short m other cereals.

Turning to shipping, he - said the cutting down of imports last year was no! adequate. In addition to a saving of one and a half million tons last year new arrangements were now working tc .stop an additional six niilion tons ofi imports. Arrangemente were being made whereby ultimately imports would be cut down by oyer ten million tons yearly, without" interfering with am* 'essential industry. . v , Furthermore we are goiiig to save a'" our timber. We are making arrangements whereby we can #et most of our minerals worked m the mines of Great Britain. We shall bo getting four million tons of ore, m addition to what we are getting now out of this country by August next, and our Uast furnaces will be adapted for that purpose. You know what ten million tons of imports mean": If this had been saved a yea-r ago there would now have been a year's supply of wheat stored ,-in this country. , Ml* Lloyd .George added that there arc eighty-five . millions busliels of wheat ir Canada. He could not say for the asking, but for the* fetching.' It ought thave been- hero. He believed that aboul twenty or. "thirty million bushc!s\then*eo-' had to jjo to tlie United States focJacP of other marjeets. We must cut. do-n*u our food until w: discovered a method of destroying- tlii.** .ocean bacillus. " That is one thing that has trot to be done, but not all. We are building ships. The Shipping Controller has af ' ready made arrangements; whereby we shall have- thrice, ahd 'possibly four times as many new ships Sn 1917* as last year.